Roy Hodgson is looking forward to having something that resembles a full squad back over the next week following a run of three games against top six sides, with limited numbers.
The Eagles boss has been without at least ten senior players for Premier League games against Tottenham, Manchester United and Chelsea.
While all ended in defeat, with the 2-1 loss at Stamford Bridge rounding things off on Saturday, Hodgson’s side pushed each close.
One player they have sorely missed is Chelsea loanee Ruben Loftus-Cheek. The creative midfielder has been passed fit having returned to his parent club to recover from an ankle problem, though was ineligible for Saturday’s game.
“We know he can be in terms of his quality, when he got injured he was a major contender for a place in the England World Cup squad,” Hodgson said.
“So the question is now, can he get back and reproduce that form? I see absolutely no reason why he can’t.
“He’s been passed fit from the injury, he couldn’t play today, in fact we still haven’t seen him as he’s trained with Chelsea all week.
“From next week on he’ll be back in training, Yohan Cabaye will be back in training [Mamadou] Sakho, hopefully, will be training from the first day rather than just the day before the match and Wilf will get a full week’s training as well.
“If that happens, my squad will be looking a lot more like the squad it was just before Christmas, it will give me options tactically and in terms of personnel, which to be quite frank I’ve not had in these last three or four weeks, which I think is a credit to these players.”
Hodgson will hope to have a bolstered side when his side look to climb out of the bottom three against Huddersfield next weekend.
